Talk:Timelines/@comment-72.192.249.109-20150621170349
First - LOVE the show, even without all of the timeline debates. But the timeline debate is a great bonus. And I am inclined to disagree with the timeline discussion here, especially the coexistance theory. I am really curious if the writer's have a working time travel/timeline theory they have rigidily adhered to (and we haven't figured out yet), or if they have been kind of winging it and therefore introduced some inconsistencies. My personal view - Creating a parallel timeline would require infinite energy to create all of the mass and energy in the new timeline. So when a new timeline is created (assuming the result of someone jumping back in time), the old timeline must evaporate. Observation 1 - So far in the show there are only two instances where we have witnessed the immediate impact to a timeline after someone jumps back from that timeline. In S1E1, old Alec smiles after sending everyone back in time, and the execution chamber and Kiera's husband still exist, so that timeline did not terminate immediately. But when Alec jumps back at the end of Season 2, in S3E1 we see the timeline he departed evaporate. It is unclear how quickly that happened - we really do not know how long Kiera was in her box before Catherine interrogated her. Kiera's conversation with Chen is about how far back Alec jumped - there is no reference provided if that jump happened a week ago, or six months ago. Proposed Premise 1 - if you go back in time and make any significant changes, the timeline you came from will evaporate. You might be able to manage events to recreate a close facsimile of that timeline. How significant a change is required to evaporate a timeline has not been revealed. Observation 2 - It is quite possible to jump back into a timeline that is different from your timeline just before the jump. When Kiera lands in 2012, her timeline has ALREADY changed. In Kiera's birth timeline, Piron was one of many companies in the corporate congress (which included LaRoche energy,) yet when she lands in 2012, Escher has built it into a powerful company that is buying up technology (e.g. LaRoche energy.) So 2012 changed from the time she left 2077, and landed in 2012. One explanation is that Warren and Jason's arrival in 1992, and the 20 years that occurred between their arrival and Kiera's arrival, changed the timeline significantly - in fact, the timeline she grew up in had likely already evaporated when she appeared in 2012 - there already was nothing to go back to. (In the same manner that when Kagame landed in 2012, he was already a wanted man - which was not in his birth history before his jump.) Proposed Premise 2 - You can jump back into a timeline that may not be your personal history. Note that this has occurred because Old Alec's time travel device, during just one use, dropped people into four different times - Elena, Warren and Jason (although they may have landed at slightly different times too), Kiera and most of Liber8, and Kagame. We do not know if any other time jumps had the same outcome - Old Alec's time machine was very different from the freelancer's time machine (which appears to contain it's own energy source.) Observation 3 - we do not know what the branches on Catherine's "tree" represents. It could be a visual representation of the various timeline braches that the freelancers think have occurred, or were going to occurr, but those timelines were terminated by their action. Catherine's desire to have Kiera tell her if things "feel right" suggests that the freelancers either came back with little accurate historical knowledge, or by 2012 there has been so much damage to the timeline they came from (after 2077), they are now winging it, hoping to at least come close to either the world the freelancers first jumped back from, or are at least trying to attain a successful world (hence they are more like a cult - not really knowing what they seek, and if it is even possible.) This explains why they collect time travel hardware and people - keep trimming that tree - hopefully to a branch they seek. Curious that the freelancer's time traveler jail never shows anyone other than the group old Alec sent back. But then they could have multiple rooms for different jumpers, keeping them separate so they don't become aware of each other. Wonder if Travis and Garza will find anyone in the freelancer jail? Or did Miller relocate them? One of the freelancers obvious technical shortfalls is that they can only detect/track actual time machines - not the individuals or the other tech they bring back. They can't even get on Alec's com net - which raises an interesting possibility - did CPS's com tech NOT exist in the timeline where freelancers first jumped to a time earlier than 2012? (which implies they were either unable to undo damage from a previous jump, or the freelancers jump caused changes...) I think there are at least 10 timelines to consider, 8 of which are clearly part of the show's story arc, and 6 of which have been exposed to the viewer: 1 through 1.n) The timeline that evolved to some date before the first time travel back in time. We do not know how far into the future this timeline progressed. Could be for millenia from now, and it could be the timeline that sent the Traveler back. Either as the "first" time traveler (timeline 1.0) or he could be from an epoch that suffered from time travel wars much as the freelancers experienced in timeline 2. So the Travelver could have been sent back from timeline 1.n to undo the damage of time travel during his epoch, only to find he either did not go far enough back, or his arrival changed his timeline so much that someone else mastered time travel much earlier than occurred in his birth timeline. 2 through 2.n) The timeline that predates Old Alec (and raises the question of whether Old Alec became aware of the Freelancers jump back from his future, learned of their tech, reversed engineered it, and sent people back to change/evaporate his timeline.) Catherine is convinced (can we believe her?) that someone from a time after Old Alec's device jumped in S1E1 (but from an earlier timeline 2.n), jumped back 1000 years to stop time travel from impacting the past, and therfore future timelines. Jumping back 1000 years implies it was in response to the jumps of others to earlier times (2.(n-1), some of which could have been prior to timeline 1's 2012), in an attempt to clear all prior time jump damage. We do not know what that traveller's historic 2012 looks like. Note that there could have been more than two timelines that included 2012, BEFORE Kiera's birth timeline. 3) Kiera's birth timeline (which only she and the other 2077 time jumpers have knowledge of.) Piron was either small or did not exist in 2012. The bombing in 2012 Vancover killed thousands (which she and Jason reduced to hundreds in timeline 5.) 4) The timeline that results from Elana's arrival in 1975. Perhaps only minor changes from timeline 3 since Elena blended into Kiera's and Elana's birth timeline, and it appears none of her tech was recovered until 2013. But Elena had descendants - we do not know if they had any significant impact on her and Kiera's birth timeline. 5) The 2012 timeline that Kiera landed in - clearly altered from Kiera's birth timeline (3) by Jason and Warren's earlier arrival. Alec's father (Escher) obviously figured something out about the future - we do not know if that knowledge came from Warren, from Jason, or both. Did Escher fake his death to protect his family, or so he could move freely to alter the future he became aware of (which would be Kiera's, Warren's, and Jason's birth timeline), either to make things better for the world, or for himself. This is the timeline of seasons 1 and 2 (at least most of season 2). 6) A timeline that occurs because of the travelver's arrival. We do not know what impact his arrival had on timeline 5, but we can assume that it happened during season 2 (based on what is presented in season 3 about Curtis's revival and Brad's arrival) - but only the freelancer's knew of it, and the traveler may have had minimal impact to the show's primary character's (although his arrival may have been the impetus for the freelancers to target Kiera - reference S3E6 when Chen remarks that the traveler did not predict Kiera joining the freelancers) We do not know for certain the traveler's timeline of origin (could be timeline 1, but it could also be timeline 100 for all we know), but he appears to possess the most advanced technology. Could he be from a timeline that predates timeline 3? 7) Brad's arrival. This occurs to timeline 6 BEFORE Emily is killed and Alec and Kiera jump back. Brad doesn't kill Kiera in this timeline, because he is not in Alec's lab when Kiera drops off the time maching parts for Alec to use. 8) Alec's arrival from one week in the future. We do not know how long this timeline lasts, but it appears Kiera jumps into it shortly after his arrival. New Alec convinces Kellog that Eshcer is the real threat, so Kellog has Emily kill Escher. 9) Kiera's arrival from timeline 7, which is evaporating because of timeline 8. There are now two Kiera's and two Alec's, although old Kiera is killed by Brad shortly after timeline 9 begins. This is the primary timeline for season 3. 10) The time marines arrive at the end of season 3. We do not know which year or timeline they come from, although they respond to a beacon that Brad brought back from his future. That beacon propagates across time, and possibly timelines? Brad knew of it and had it in 2038 ("the hail mary for the hail mary".) And the traveler appears to have been waiting for it's activation, and the time marine's arrival. Note that timelines 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8 never make it to 2038. Yet the time beacon that enables timeline 10 to occur somehow made it's way to 2038. That would imply that timeline 9 (or 9.1, 9.2, 9.3, each with minor jumps to no earlier than the marine's arrival in 2014) did extend out to 2038. The big question is which timeline do the time marines come from - 1, 2, 3, 9, or some yet to occur timeline? Yet I would bet my money on the writer's proving the above is wrong.... Sure wish season 4 was not the last season - this is so much fun. Dave Evans